The End

At the startled cries, movement immediately broke out in the two rooms.

A large crowd came rushing out in a dark mass. Some had not even put on their clothes, only clutching long sabers in their hands.

By the light, the rooms could be seen strewn in utter chaos, filled with scraps of clothing from village women.

The naked girls had either been abused beyond recognition or violated until they no longer wished to live.

"Who the hell was shouting? Where is anyone?"

"Damn it, which dog bastard that doesn't want to live is screaming out here? Looking for death!"

Flower Snake Gang leader Hua Hai and his son Hua Jianghe swept their eyes over the stronghold. Seeing that the two sentries were standing there properly and that there was not the slightest disturbance within the stronghold, their anger immediately flared.

"Must have been some little bastard from that village shouting. Tomorrow, all of you will go door to door and collect silver for me. Squeeze them dry!"

With that, father and son dragged the beautiful woman at the door, who was trying to run outside, back upstairs to continue enjoying themselves.

The other thugs each went about their business. Only four or five of them were displeased and wanted to ask those sentry bastards what they had been watching.

"You dog bastards, someone shouted that loudly just now. Why didn't you go catch him?

"If I get my hands on him, I'll skin that little punk alive!"

"Old Zhu, Old Dog, I'm talking to you. What, gone mute?"

"Fuck, I'm pissed to death. Get those two down here!"

The two hurried toward the sentry post. Before they knew it, their feet struck a hidden line.

Swoosh, swoosh~

Wooden arrows launched by animal sinews struck the backs of their heads with precision.

Thud! Dust flew into the air.

Two more thugs fell.

The shouting thug stared with round eyes and rubbed them hard. "Boss..."

Splurt!

A figure suddenly appeared behind him. Then a small dagger pierced through his heart and stabbed out through his chest and abdomen.

He twisted his head around in terror, but failed to see the killer's face. All he saw was a pair of sinister, ghostly green wolf eyes.

The person beside him heard the commotion and tried to flee back inside.

Duan Xuan drew his blade with his left hand and threw the corpse with his right. The instant the body tripped that man, the dagger came down upon his head.

It split his skull cleanly in two.

"Damn it, can't even enjoy a woman in peace. What the hell are those people outside doing?"

Hua Hai punched the woman beneath him unconscious, then rose to head outside.

"Father, why bother with them? But your son is curious too. Just how beautiful is that Duan Family girl? Old Fifth and the others talked about her today, and they nearly made me drool myself to death!"

"I haven't seen her either. Tomorrow, we'll capture her alive and bring her back. She can be your servant."

"Father is the best. Don't get angry, leave such a small matter to me." Hua Jianghe grabbed the terrified woman beneath him, tossed her into Hua Hai's arms, threw on a short coat, and moved to open the door.

Suddenly, alarm bells rang wildly in his heart.

Shing!

He yanked out the long saber hanging on the door and viciously stabbed it through the wooden door.

Pfft!

The saber struck the figure outside.

Then he violently pulled the door open.

A subordinate, pus-filled blood gushing from his mouth, dropped to his knees in front of him. At that very moment—

From behind the corpse, a gleaming dagger shot out, still hanging with faint threads of blood.

Hua Jianghe had expected this. The instant he opened the door, he stepped back.

But how could Duan Xuan fail to anticipate his close-range defense?

His other hand pulled a dirt ball from his pouch. As he tossed it into the air, he sent force through it and shattered it.

As the saying went, an open spear was easy to ward off, but a hidden arrow was hard to defend against. Who could have imagined that what Duan Xuan threw was not a hidden weapon, but a handful of sand?

Hua Jianghe's eyes were instantly blinded. Seize his illness and take his life!

Veins bulged beneath Duan Xuan's feet.

While Hua Jianghe could not open his eyes, he drove a vicious punch into his chest.

This punch contained all the force of Duan Xuan's profound Bright Force, along with the fiercest strike of the Broken Mountain Fist.

On the spot, Hua Jianghe felt as though his heart had been smashed by an enormous hammer.

The boom boom from that strike shook the meridians throughout his body, rupturing them to varying degrees.

Duan Xuan left as soon as he succeeded, not forgetting to throw the corpse that was about to fall at Hua Hai.

"Son!" The entire scene had ended in the blink of an eye.

He had watched with his own eyes as his son anticipated the enemy's attack, only to be counter-killed and then finished off. Rage instantly surged into the heavens.

Naked as the day he was born, he pulled a long saber from beneath the bed and smashed through the window, blasting a huge gap into the square wall opening.

Yet his son's death had already driven him mad with fury. When he came outside and saw corpses strewn everywhere, Hua Hai's first reaction was for his scalp to go numb.

"Damn bastard! Damn it!"

At that moment, the masked Duan Xuan was already standing outside the stronghold gate, making an utterly provocative gesture.

Whoosh!

Hua Hai exploded forward, using a set of steps to cover more than ten meters in a single stride.

Clack, clack, clack!

More than a dozen animal traps snapped shut a second behind him. Hua Hai was too fast; the traps could not even catch his shadow.

Duan Xuan did not hesitate and continued with the plan he had envisioned.

He kicked the gate apart and ran toward the place where he had been lying in wait.

Behind him, Hua Hai was like a fierce tiger descending the mountain, actually leaping high down from the watchtower.

Just as he was about to pounce on Duan Xuan, Duan Xuan lowered himself to the ground, turning into a wild wolf. The sudden burst of power flung his entire body to the side.

"A wolf? You're from Wolf Stronghold? Wasn't Wolf Stronghold wiped out... Wolf Soul?

"It's you. You've returned. The destruction of Wolf Stronghold had nothing to do with my Flower Snake Gang. Stop right there!" Hua Hai shouted.

How could Duan Xuan possibly stop?

Yet his speed remained neither too fast nor too slow, and his control of the distance was exquisitely precise.

He always made Hua Hai feel that he had a chance to catch him.

Just as Hua Hai burst forward repeatedly, steadily closing the gap until they were only an arm's length apart—

Rip!

Duan Xuan stomped sideways, shoving the dirt away by a hair's breadth. Though he had been running, he forcibly stopped in his tracks!

His fist stance swung with the momentum. He bent at the waist to shed the force, while Hua Hai, caught off guard behind him, could only grit his teeth and attack head-on.

With a clever application of force, Duan Xuan used four ounces to deflect a thousand pounds, rolling Hua Hai half a turn over his back and throwing him aside.

"Who the hell are you? How dare you be so bold? Do you know whose gang the Flower Snake Gang is?" Hua Hai's eyes were red with rage, and his entire body trembled.

His son was dead, and his brothers were dead. He swore that he would cut the bastard before him into a thousand pieces.

But just as he took half a step forward, he sharply sensed that he seemed to have stepped on a trigger line earlier.

Yet after waiting for quite some time, nothing happened around him. He stopped worrying about it, let out a furious roar, and prepared to dart forward.

By then, Duan Xuan was already far away.

Yes, that trigger line had been a dud. Bright Force martial artists differed from ordinary people; their senses were far sharper, and ordinary traps were useless against them.

To truly make traps work, one had to deceive them again and again.

"Why do you keep running? You're also a Bright Force martial artist, and a ruthless one at that. If you've got the guts, fight me!"

Duan Xuan said nothing, only fleeing in another direction. Hua Hai's mouth twitched, clearly unable to hold it together any longer.

But there was no helping it. His enemy was right before his eyes. He could not possibly let him escape.

Yet as he ran, Hua Hai realized something was wrong.

Although this man's route was winding and chaotic, the overall direction was always toward the southwestern slope beneath the stronghold.

He immediately recalled how the brothers in the stronghold had died. Their wounds had not been caused by a martial artist's heavy blows, but by trap after trap.

"I can't keep chasing. I need to report this matter in full detail to—"

"What? Your son is dead, and as his father, you don't even have the courage to avenge him? You think you deserve to be a gang leader?" Duan Xuan actually ran back, hands on his hips, spewing one heart-piercing taunt after another.

"You infuriate me to death!" Hua Hai was completely enraged. He had assumed Duan Xuan would continue fleeing, but Duan Xuan behaved so strangely, slowly removing his outer garment and setting layers of traps and clothing by the roadside, revealing lean shoulders knotted with muscle.

Crack, crack, crack!

He rolled his arms. "The Flower Snake Gang has existed for barely a year, yet you've forcibly taken thirty-seven village women and murdered more than a hundred elderly, weak, sick, and disabled people.

"Your sins are too grave. Even if you want to run, I won't give you the chance!" Duan Xuan spread his hands at his waist.

He threw back his head and let out a long howl. The wolf's cry tore through the darkness and spread over the entire village.

It made every villager inside their homes tremble.

Then his bearing suddenly changed. His waist and back bent as he charged forward in a bizarre, twisting pattern.

"So you really are Wolf Tian's younger brother, Wolf Soul. All flash and no substance—die!" Hua Hai's arms moved nimbly, attacking from front and rear like a slick Flower Snake, elusive and unpredictable.

Duan Xuan's two wolf claws countered every move. Claw winds entwined with snake tongues, and within a minute, the two had exchanged thirty-three moves.

Hua Hai truly deserved his reputation as a veteran Bright Force expert. When his palms attacked, they transformed into lifelike Flower Snakes, his techniques changing without end.

No matter how fast Duan Xuan's wolf claws were, there would always be openings. Time and again, Hua Hai struck different parts of his body. Though none were fatal, Duan Xuan's movements gradually slowed with a numbness as though he had been poisoned.

"Hmph, so this is all you can do. You worthless trash who only knows how to launch sneak attacks!" Hua Hai grew more excited the longer they fought.

He had no idea that the two had already descended more than a hundred meters southwest from the place where they had first clashed.

Then came dozens more evenly matched exchanges.

Suddenly, Duan Xuan stopped retreating. His two claws abruptly clenched into fists as his qi and blood gathered with the ground, rapidly spreading through his body.

He sank his qi into his dantian, gathered a breath of inner force, and condensed his power onto his right fist at top speed.

"Hah!" The powerful strike shot out like a cannonball blasting from a barrel.

Hua Hai had mistaken Duan Xuan for someone who could only slash rapidly with his claws. His force had been spent, making it difficult to change direction. At the sight of the fist, there was no emotion left in his heart but fear.

But he could not retreat, nor was there any way to retreat. He could only bring his two claws together, transforming into a complete Flower Snake and opening its fangs to bite Duan Xuan.

Both sides had poured every ounce of force into this strike. Yet in the second before contact, Duan Xuan changed his fist into a palm and dispersed his force.

Because from the beginning, he had never intended to clash head-on.

He had been preparing all along for the second move, third form of the Broken Mountain Fist—Rupture!

Duan Xuan unleashed the Frost Wolf Vanishing-Step. The force extending beneath his feet erupted in full, propelling him unreasonably around to Hua Hai's side. Then he kicked out, and Hua Hai could no longer keep his footing, rolling down the slope.

Then came—

Clack, clack.

Swoosh, swoosh, swoosh!

Smack, smack, smack!

Every hidden weapon concealed around them was triggered without exception, all raining down upon Hua Hai.

The pain made Hua Hai cry out miserably. When he slammed into a large tree with a boom—

The final Trap was triggered. Three metal nail-headed arrows broke free from their animal sinews.

Crack, crack, crack! They pierced into Hua Hai's right leg bone!

Blood flowed from Hua Hai's seven orifices, and the traps had broken his tendons and bones.

He slumped against the tree, his eyes unfocused.

And in his eyes, Duan Xuan—the youth who had toyed with him in the palm of his hand—seemed like a burning fireball.

His qi and blood grew greater and fiercer.

Third move of the Broken Mountain Fist—Peak-Crusher!

Carrying Duan Xuan's layer upon layer of accumulated force, it crashed forward in one overwhelming surge.

Duan Xuan's right fist and left fist struck out with bang bang bang sounds, like the beating of drums.

The thought of avenging the common people and clearing away hidden dangers for his aunt echoed through Duan Xuan's mind again and again.

Only when Hua Hai no longer looked human, his head snapping free together with his broken neck, did Duan Xuan slowly stop.

"Whew, it's over!"